I have found that the biggest deciding factor in value is the competence of the management.
The biggest problems are always with the small (like 8 units) complexes that are self-managed.
My favorite was a couple of months ago where the “president” of the HOA had not held a meeting since 2006 and was currently running a deficit with a reserve account funded to the tune of about 30%.
Nobody even had a copy of the cc&r’s and the insurance was insufficient for any type of lending.
In that case, I strongly suspect the president was just keeping the dues.
Even in the meltdown complexes, the professionally managed hoa’s tend to minimize the likelihood of insolvency or unexpected assessments. Of course that does not eliminate the reality of living in a common-interest development.
